


A Life Alone

by laniew1



Category: Fall Out Boy, Panic! at the Disco, Young Veins
Genre: F/M, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-07-25
Updated: 2008-02-15
Packaged: 2020-05-12 08:20:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 18,325
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19225300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/laniew1/pseuds/laniew1
Summary: Ryan thinks that when its time for their ‘Behind The Music’ that Panic! At The Disco could be summed as such… Four came, four sang, four laughed, three made the decision to ‘take a break’.





	1. Chapter 1

**A Life Alone**

 

 

They corner Ryan in his room, his sanctuary from the fans and the noise and being ‘Ryan Ross’.

Ryan thinks that when its time for their ‘ _Behind The Music_ ’ that Panic! At The Disco could be summed as such…

Four came, four sang, four laughed, three made the decision to ‘take a break’.

It was a new tour, for a new album. They have two buses and everyone has their own room and Ryan will only realize after that when Spencer had spent time on the other bus it wasn’t to give Ryan the solitude that he craved and that he and Jon were the only ones taking advantage of having separate rooms.

They corner him in his room and they all sit down and Spencer does all the talking, Brendon intercutting here and there and Jon giving his two cents worth and what choice does Ryan have but to agree with the decision that has, obviously, already been made without him.

He didn’t understand, and he didn’t want to agree. But he doesn’t think they even notice. They’re too busy looking at each other and talking without talking and he and Spencer used to be able to do that, and Brendon and him and Jon and him to a small degree.

He wonders at what point he’d been cut off, he hadn’t thought that he was that oblivious to the happenings around him.

He wonders _why_ he’d been cut off.

“Just a little break,” Spencer says again and he looks at Ryan and Ryan pastes a fake small smile on his face and Spencer, who has known him forever and a day and can tell when he’s going to utter a lie by the change in his breathing, he doesn’t notice.

So Ryan nods, mouth firmly shut because if he opens it he’ll ask ‘why, why, why’? And maybe there is no explanation they could give him that will make things make sense.

Make things less like he’d been cut out of his own band and that his thoughts on the matter hadn’t mattered in the least.

These are his best friends, his brothers and they hadn’t even asked for his thoughts on the matter before they’d made the decision for him.

He wonders what he’s supposed to do with all the words in his head now that there isn’t a voice to sing them or a band to play them.

 

******************************************************************************

 

They dissolve easily, he doesn’t throw fits left and right like they’d most likely expected, he wishes he could, because he still doesn’t understand and he wants to.

The album hadn’t done _that_ badly, not as well as they’d hoped but not as horribly as he’d feared, so he doesn’t understand why taking a break _right now_ is so important.

But he doesn’t say anything and he doesn’t throw fits, he doesn’t really say anything at all because he’s afraid of the ‘why, why, why’s’ that are just barely tied up behind his closed mouth.

Towards the end, he thinks, they maybe see something isn’t totally right. Because Spencer starts shooting him looks of concern and Brendon stares at him like he thinks Ryan is something fragile that he’s dropped and broken and hasn’t figured out where all the pieces were so he could make Jon glue it back together.

He spends a lot of time in his bunk, because once the decision was made and Ryan had been told, well Spencer and Brendon and Jon obviously felt there was no need to hide in the other bus where they’d _made_ all their decisions and they’d subsequently had it sent away.

So they could be one big happy family again. That plan probably doesn’t go the way they want it to, because Ryan still doesn’t understand and he doesn’t want to scream and yell the not-understanding to the sky… so he hides.

“Why don’t you come play with us?” Jon asks, hand pressed to his shoulder and there is always concern there but Ryan doesn’t know if it is real concern or if Jon is maybe the best actor of all them and besides…

“Writing,” Ryan says, waves his journal and he walks away, closing himself in his bunk and writing words that no one will see, that Brendon won’t sing and he puts his headphones on and doesn’t listen to the low murmurs that are probably about him.

 

******************************************************************************

 

He finds the little cottage a month before the end of the tour (before the end of _them_ ).

He can’t go back to Vegas, to him Vegas means him and Spencer and Brendon (and Brent) and being young and ambitious and ready to take on the world. (It also means pain and suffering and never being good enough for his father but he’s buried those feelings in words and music that he’ll never play live again.)

Chicago was out because he was pretty sure that was where Jon was going, Spencer and Brendon in tow.

And not LA because of Pete and the rest of Fall Out Boy and that’s where he’s _expected_ to go and it hurts that Pete had to have known about this, okayed this decision because Pete is their boss for the most part and taking a ‘break’ isn’t something that can be just decided on a whim.

At the next rest stop he stays on the bus while the others get off to get junk food (and talk about him) and he makes the call and an offer.

The cottage is tiny, secluded, quaint.

It is perfect.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Keltie laughs at him when he tells her his plans. She doesn’t think that Spencer and Brendon and Jon are going to let him go that easily and Ryan doesn’t tell her that he gets talked _at_ more then he gets talked _to_.

At their last stop, their very last concert, Spencer sits down with him the night before and talks at him for hours.

About their past and their childhood and reminding him that it was just for a little while, to allow everyone to regroup and Ryan wonders the whole time at what point they’ll call and tell him it is over.

He thinks that this might be how a lot of bands break up.

They took breaks and then just never came back from them.

 

******************************************************************************

 

They say goodbye at the airport, Brendon’s arm over Spencer’s shoulder and Ryan thinks it telling that Spencer isn’t shrugging it off. Just raises an eyebrow and glares at him, Brendon grins and doesn’t move.

He is hugged by all of them, even Brendon lets go of Spencer long enough to wrap his arms around him and Ryan can’t make out what is being murmured against his neck but he thinks that he isn’t supposed to anyway.

“Come back when you’re done,” Jon says, like Ryan is just going out of town to run errands or something.

Jon is the last hug (Spencer used to be, but now Spencer and Brendon are wrapped up in one another) and Ryan just nods, better to agree with whatever they said then run the risk of ‘why, why, why’ spewing forth in greater numbers then he would like.

He figures that it is a moot point anyways, by the time he would (hypothetically) be ready to come back to Chicago they will call him and tell him that they think the break should be permanent.

They think he is going to Vegas or L.A. He hasn’t shown anyone his plane ticket because no one has asked to see it and the minute that he goes through security they won’t care where he went anyway.

His heart hurts and his throat burns and the words rush through his mind, he taps his fingers against Jon’s back before pulling away.

He has his notebook in his bag and he knows that the words in his mind are melancholy and sad and it is probably a good thing that Brendon will never sing them because they would have to offer boxes of Kleenex’s free of charge at the door.

He smiles one last time and settles his bag on his shoulder, he takes a step away and watches the three of them reform themselves into one unit, without him.

They won’t miss him, Ryan decides, they already fit together like they know they aren’t missing any pieces.

It still hurts.

 

******************************************************************************

  
“I’m not living here,” Keltie says, raised eyebrow and crossed arms.

“I didn’t ask you to,” Ryan says absently. He is watching the movers unload boxes into the living room and he can’t wait for everyone to leave so he can start sorting through his life and putting things where they belong.

“I know,” she says softly, he looks over at her and she looks back at him with distant resignation and sadness.

“I’m sorry,” he says. And he is. Keltie is the closest thing to a best friend he has since Spencer decided that he no longer wanted the position and vacated it without naming his substitute.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Pete is maybe the only one who figures out that Ryan isn’t where he’s supposed to be at the beginning.

Ryan realizes this when Pete e-mails him within three days of his moving into the cottage and asks him where he is.

Ryan responds by describing the sunset he’s looking at.

They communicate that way and only twice does Pete write: _pick up your damn kick_

Ryan’s sidekick is buried in a box in the top of the hall closet and he only reaches for it twice a day now instead of the half a dozen times that he’d gone for it the first day, he instead sends him a list of strange and unusual things he’d seen during a walk into town.

It takes another two weeks before he starts getting multiple e-mails a day. He thinks that might be about the point when Pete went to the others and they all realized that _nobody_ knew where he was.

Which was probably a feat unto itself as he wasn’t exactly a nobody.

But he hasn’t put makeup on in a month; and he doesn’t dress like ‘Ryan Ross, emo rock star’ anymore.

He dresses like a normal twenty-something in blue jeans and t-shirts, he leaves his makeup bag under the bathroom sink and he leaves off all the embellishments that he would normally affix to himself, so he was, almost, entirely anonymous.

Pete threatens and cajoles, though he never gives out his e-mail to any of the others. Ryan thinks that he likes being the only one that has any sort of contact with Ryan.

_ill hire a pd_

_where are you?_

_are you ok?_

_ill sic spencer on you_

_theyre worried about you_

The last one causes Ryan to avoid his e-mail for a week. Because of all the people he thinks would lie to him Pete isn’t one of them.

He’s seen the pictures, he picks up the check-out magazines when he gets groceries and he’s _seen_ the pictures of Pete and Brendon at a club opening, arms over one another’s shoulders, seen the pictures of Brendon and Spencer and Jon with big grins, all wrapped up in another.

They don’t miss him; he knows Spencer well enough that, even in pictures, he can read only happiness in Spencer’s eyes.

When he turns his computer back on there are twenty-seven e-mails of varying degrees of worry from Pete waiting, he reads them, then deletes them all without responding to them and then opens word and starts typing.

He has words in his head and if he can’t make them into a song maybe he can make them into something else.

Besides if he waits long enough Pete will get bored and move on and he won’t have to worry about e-mails wondering where he is.

He likes that there is exactly one person (besides the bank people and the real estate people and the lawyers and the guys that had moved his belongings from Vegas to the little cottage) that knows where he is.

If they haven’t figured out to talk to Keltie yet that isn’t his fault.

Though, he reminds himself, Keltie _was_ sworn to secrecy and Keltie took her promises seriously.

 

******************************************************************************

 

He might not be writing lyrics anymore and he might not have the three of them and their instruments of choice ringing in his ear but he doesn’t stop writing.

He can’t.

He still has all the words and when Keltie calls him on Sunday to check in (she always calls on a Sunday and he wants to tell her that she doesn’t need to but it is nice to hear a voice that knows him so he doesn’t) he tells her, “I’m writing a book.”

And waits for her to tell him that it is a stupid idea and that he is an idiot.

“What’s it about?” she asks instead.

And he tells her about the convoluted plot, about best friends since childhood that drift apart when they both fall in love the same guy, about how the hero goes away to allow them to be together without having to feel guilty. How he finds himself in a small town, where the neighbors are friendly and always have a welcome smile and how he comes to accept that being alone is not always that bad.

Keltie is silent on the other end for a long enough time that Ryan thinks that she’s hung up on him instead of telling him that his idea sucks.

“You deserve to be happy,” she says.

Ryan hmms at her and they talk for a few more minutes about the weather and a premiere that she’d gone to before they hang up.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Despite his best efforts he makes friends.

Colleen at the book store sets aside paperbacks that she thinks would interest him after they have an hour long discussion on modern day poets and the difficulties of getting published in that genre.

Sandy at the grocery store pulls the weekly magazines down if they look like they’re going to run out before he gets into town for his groceries, because she’s seen him pout when the US Weekly was sold out.

Just because he’s not living the Hollywood life any longer doesn’t mean that he doesn’t like to keep up with those people that he knew that were still there.

Mark at the coffee shop remembers his caffeine of choice after his first visit and sometimes Ryan threatens to change his order just to shake things up.

“You like things to be the same,” Mark just says, taking his money and smiling at him.

One day he presses a flyer into his hand along with Ryan’s change.

“I’m having my first gallery opening thing,” Mark shrugs and Ryan glances down at it. “Be nice to see some familiar faces there.” Ryan nods and walks away to get his coffee, he folds the flyer up and shoves it into his pocket. He finds it when he’s sorting clothes for laundry.

He goes because he thinks it would be rude not to.

Besides he thinks that Mark has been undercharging him for his coffee for the last two weeks and Ryan doesn’t think it’s bribery but he likes to return his favors.

 

******************************************************************************

 

The gallery opening is well underway by the time Ryan arrives. Wearing the one suit that he can piece together, and there isn’t a rosette or a piece of lace to be found.

He almost went for the eyeliner in the bathroom when he was getting ready and his hand had stopped over it, hovering as he’d stared at himself in the mirror. He almost didn’t recognize the young man staring back at him.

And that is who is there now, a young man not the femme boy that he’d played like a role for so many years.

It had been a month and a half since the last time he’d put anything on his face other then cleaners and moisturizers.

He had put the liner back and closed his makeup bag, stowed it under the sink and left, grabbing his keys on the way out.

Mark is pleased to see him; they exchange a manly hug and big smiles. He introduces him to his fiancé who is a small vivacious red head with a wide, white smile. Her name is Maria and she shakes his hand and kisses him on the cheek and thanks him profusely for coming.

The gallery is packed and he waves at Sandy and is accosted by Colleen when she wraps her arms around his waist.

“I don’t know a single person here with the exception of three,” Ryan admits, Colleen laughs and links arms with him, dragging him from group to group for introductions and there is only one instance that scares him.

The mayors’ sixteen year old daughter opens her mouth and closes it when Colleen introduces him and Ryan just pleads with his eyes for her to not say anything and she doesn’t.

Though she does find him later when he’s going from painting to painting and demands an autograph in exchange for her silence, she has several pictures to choose from and she’ll even allow him to choose the one that he’ll sign and personalize.

Ryan agrees, because anything that keeps the others from finding him any quicker is a good thing, he’s not foolish enough to think he can hide forever. But he hopes that he can pull it off for longer then a couple of months.

He buys two paintings at the end of the night, one he’ll send to Pete because he thinks that the colors and the mood are things that Pete will appreciate, the other is for himself.

Mark’s jaw drops when he pulls his checkbook out.

“I just wanted a few people that I knew here,” he blusters, Ryan just nods and makes out the check.

He’s buying the pieces because they spoke to him, like the words in his mind do sometimes; and he’s buying them because Mark didn’t invite him because he saw a prospective sale.

 

******************************************************************************

 

It’s almost midnight when he gets back to the cottage, he stopped for coffee on the way and he’s hoping to get a chapter written before he goes to sleep.

He left a light on in the kitchen and he curses himself for not leaving the porch light on, he hadn’t thought he’d be gone for so long.

He almost stumbles over a bag when he goes up the steps and he hears the voice before he sees anyone.

“Ryan Ross.”

Ryan squints and takes a step back.

Because that’s Pete sitting on his swing, one leg drawn up to his chest and staring at him like he’s a ghost or a mirage. Hemingway sitting next to him, giving him what Ryan is pretty sure is a disapproving look from where his head is resting on his paws.

“Pete.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

It’s surreal moving around his cottage with Pete there.

With anyone there.

Ryan hasn’t had anyone in his home since Keltie had left and where before there had seemed to be so much space, now Ryan feels caged in, trapped.

If Pete has found him, it is only a matter of time before the others land on his doorstep.

His flight or fight reflex is being triggered and he doesn’t have anywhere else to go.

Pete watches him in the kitchen, he’s leaning against one counter and Ryan is moving just to move. He feels almost like Brendon right then, all hyperactive energy, but he thinks if he stops moving then it’ll sink in that his peace and quiet are a thing of the past.

“Are you going to ignore me all night?” Pete asks, bemused tone and Ryan wants to say he isn’t ignoring him.

He _couldn’t_ ignore him, his body is almost hard wired to respond to Pete’s presence and he’s not a seventeen year old fan boy anymore, but that boy is still in there and mumbling _**‘Pete Wentz** is **standing** in my **kitchen**_ ’, complete with dreamy sighs and heart shaped eyes.

Besides, he doesn’t think that anyone _could_ ignore Pete.

He’s just choosing, to attempt, to not respond to his presence, which means not looking at him.

“I’m not ignoring you,” Ryan mumbles, Hemmy brushes up against his leg and Ryan glances down to see him glaring up at him reproachfully. “I can’t believe you brought him with you.”

“Well it wasn’t like I was going to leave him behind was it, besides I wasn’t sure how long it was going to take to get your head screwed back on straight and I wasn’t willing to leave him with Joe for that long.”

“There’s nothing wrong with the way my head is screwed on,” Ryan mutters.

“No? You just go off and buy cottages in the middle of the ass end of nowhere because things in Ryan-land are all hunky dory.”

“Ryan-land?” Ryan scrubs at a spot on his counter. “And this isn’t nowhere; we have a Wal-Mart you know.”

Pete snorts and Ryan knows that if he turns he’ll see Pete rolling his eyes at him.

“And that’s your sure fire sign of civilization, that the town has a Wal-Mart? And Ryan-land is that space in your head that you seem to reside mostly in and make stupid decisions based on, Brendon named it and we voted on it as a group.”

“Why are you here?” Ryan asks softly, maybe they’ve sent _Pete_ to tell him that things are over.

He feels Pete’s arms go around his chest, locking his arms at his side and he stiffens. He could break free if he needed to, but Pete is strong and there would be a fight and most likely bruises and injuries.

“I only found you because of Keltie you know, she’s worried about you. She thought that you would have broke by now and called Spencer or me or _someone_ to let us know where you were and that you were okay.”

“I told you that I was fine,” Ryan mutters.

“No you’re not, trust me, if anyone can tell if someone is not okay it’s me,” Pete rushes on when Ryan goes to disagree. “If you were okay you would have gone to Vegas for a couple of days, maybe did some gambling, possibly come out to L.A. and stayed with me while you figured out how to confront Spencer and Brendon about the fact that they’re super-gay for each other and neither one told you. And then you would have gone to Chicago and done it, you would have fought and maybe not talked for a few days and you would have wrote a song or two about your best friends not being able to trust you with their hearts or something about unrequited love. You would have all made up and gone back into the studio and started working on the third album and things would be okay then.”

Ryan breathes, hangs his head. Maybe Pete doesn’t know about the break, about the break- _up_ that is sure to follow before to long.

“You wouldn’t have run off to the ass end of nowhere, because Wal-Mart or no, this _is_ nowhere. I wouldn’t have Spencer and Brendon and Jon calling me five times a day asking for updates on you because apparently I’m the only one that knew that you had seven e-mails and then tried every single one of them until I got a response.”

“They wanted to take a break,” Ryan whispers. And it still hurts, the decision made without him. “They wanted to take a break and they _told_ me we were doing it. They never asked my input or talked about it with me; they decided that we were doing it so we did.”

“A break means a break, no concerts, no singing. A break means taking a vacation and maybe going to an amusement park or a couple of parties or something,” Pete squeezes him, rocks him slightly back and forth, like he’s a child that needed to be soothed.

“It’s just a matter of time before it becomes a break up,” Ryan says morosely, because he’d seen the writing on the wall, he hadn’t needed anyone to spell things out for him.

Pete just sighs, like Ryan is disappointing him somehow and he feels like he’s missing something crucial.

“Taking a break means taking a break, it doesn’t have to mean anything more then that Ryan.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

Pete has brought two bags with him besides Hemmy’s carrier. Ryan sees them and wonders how long he plans on staying.

“I don’t have a guestroom,” Ryan shakes his head.

He does, but there is no bed in there. Just his desk and chair and computer and he doesn’t want Pete Wentz anywhere _near_ his computer.

At least not unsupervised.

Unsupervised he would find the rough draft for the book that Ryan is writing and Ryan doesn’t feel that it is in anyway ready to be read by anyone besides him.

It’s a work in progress and he’d like an opportunity to read it and reread it and be his own worst critic before he lets other eyes gaze upon it.

“We’ve shared a bed before,” Pete rolls his eyes at him like he’s an idiot.

“I have a couch,” Ryan says ignoring him. “I’ve napped on it once or twice, it seems comfortable.”

Because when they’d shared a bed they’d been something more then the friends that they were now, before Pete decided that playing it straight was the best thing for his career and his band and ended that part of their relationship.

“Are you afraid I’m going to sully your virtue?” Pete leers at him and Ryan wonders, suddenly, if he’s being handled. If Pete is being light and friendly and leering and smirking to put him at ease and keep him from being depressed and maudlin about his band breaking up without him.

“I don’t have any virtue left to be sullied, you made sure of that,” Ryan mutters. By the time Pete had ended their relationship (and Ryan wonders why _he’s_ always being the one told that things are over, instead of having the opportunity to be the one to end things) there were very few things that they hadn’t done together in Pete’s bed.

Ryan misses that sometimes. The closeness and togetherness and having someone who was just his. Keltie had been that before she’d slipped into Spencer’s role of best friend.

He wonders if he should be honored that he is one of the handful of people that Pete Wentz has actually, completely, slept with. That he can’t be brushed under the rug and when (if) Pete ever finally settles down with someone, his name (along with Mikey and Jeanae and Ashlee) is going to be listed off to his wife-to-be as those that have shared his bed and his life, if even for a short time.

 

******************************************************************************

 

He wakes and feels as if he is clinging to his bed with his fingernails, half of his body is sweating, the other half is freezing.

He feels a hand twitching against his stomach and puffs of breath against his shoulder. He twists his head and sees Hemmy’s head sharing his pillow and Pete taking up a good 7/8 of the bed along with all the blankets.

He knows that he’s skinny, but he doesn’t understand why, when he shares his bed with someone, that translates to ‘I only need 4 inches to sleep on, feel free to sprawl to your hearts content’.

The three times that he was forced to share a bed with Brendon because of ‘Hotel issues’, Brendon had managed to kick him off the bed while he was sleeping, the fourth time a Hotel had screwed up he’d just slept in the tub.

Because as much as he wanted to share a bed with Brendon, falling off the bed in the middle of the night - was not a repercussion he was willing to deal with. He wonders, idly, if Spencer has curbed Brendon’s ‘kicking people off the bed’ tendency or if Brendon only kicks people out of his bed if he doesn’t really want them there in the first place.

He doesn’t know why Pete is in bed with him, when he closed himself in his bedroom Pete was still grumbling about being forced to sleep on the couch and Ryan would have given up the bed and slept on the couch himself; if only Pete hadn’t acted like getting Ryan’s bed was something he was owed.

“Pete,” he hisses and Pete twitches and kicks out with one leg. Ryan traps it with one of his and manages to not fall off the bed. He silently congratulates himself and stares at Pete until his eyes snap open.

He knows that Pete hates that.

“Dude,” his eyes close almost immediately, it’s still dark outside.

“Aren’t you supposed to be on the couch?” Ryan says pointedly, he goes to pluck Pete’s hand off his stomach and instead lays his on top of it. He thinks his fingers are stupid and wonders when they got a mind of their own.

Pete’s hand flexes under his, then he links their fingers together and a small smile appears on his face. Ryan looks away because that expression has always meant that Pete has got something he wanted and Ryan stopped being that thing that Pete wanted a year and a half ago.

“Your couch is in no way comfortable, Hemmy insisted that your bed would be plenty big enough,” Pete’s voice sounds tired and Ryan almost doesn’t say anything because he doesn’t know what Pete’s been dealing with since he left.

“Pete,” he starts, when he makes a motion like he’s going to get out of the bed and go sleep on the couch himself, Pete squeezes his fingers and manages to haul Ryan closer without actually using any force.

Hemmy opens one eye and glares, then stands, shakes and moves to the bottom of the bed where he pointedly faces away from them.

Pete laughs and manages to get Ryan all cuddled up against him, arms and legs wrapped tightly around him and Ryan would think it meant something, if he didn’t also think that Pete was attempting to trap him.

“Go back to sleep Ryan,” Pete says softly, he kisses his cheek and his forehead and then closes his eyes.

Ryan sighs and does just that.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Pete is on the phone in his backyard; Ryan thinks that he’s talking to the others. He’s sure that he heard Spencer’s name at least once.

There’s a knock at the door and he sees Pete glance inside and Ryan frowns at him before he goes to answer it.

Mark stands there, two wrapped paintings at his feet and a cup of coffee in his hand.

“Since when do you deliver?” Ryan asks when Mark hands him the cup; he pops the lid off and takes a deep breath, eyes closing.

He had to forego his coffee that morning because he didn’t dare leave Pete alone in his house, he might come back and find it had been sold out from under him.

“Only to friends that spend a couple of grand buying paintings at a show I was pretty sure that I wasn’t going to sell anything at,” Mark grins at him. “I was going to give them to you this morning but you never showed up.”

“Had a friend appear in town last night,” Ryan props the door open and lets Mark brush past him, paintings in hand.

He’s already thinking about the perfect place for his painting, he’ll force Pete to take his with him when he leaves, when he notices Mark looking at the pictures on the wall.

His pictures, his life. He’s in a lot of them because they’re shots of the guys.

He’s not hidden who he is, not in his home, he’s just not had any visitors enter since he got everything just right and he can see the way that Mark’s eyes are darting from him to the pictures and back again, that the other man has put two and two together and come up with four.

He opens and closes his mouth like he wants to say something and instead shakes his head.

Mark’s eyes move past him and Ryan knows that Pete has walked in. A quick glance back confirms that Pete is standing there, phone still pressed to his ear, eyes narrowed at Mark.

“Coffee tomorrow? Normal time?” Mark says, Ryan nods. He’s waiting for Mark to say something and Mark doesn’t, just smiles brightly, friendly as always. He inclines his head at Pete and leaves.

Ryan stands there, clutching his coffee between two hands and wonders if he’s going to get assaulted when he goes into town next and if he could call and beg Zack to come be his bodyguard again.

 

******************************************************************************

 

“Jon’s getting married,” Pete says at dinner. They’ve ordered in because Ryan doesn’t trust Pete in his kitchen and Ryan hadn’t wanted to cook for two people.

“You’ll have to send me pictures,” Ryan says.

“I’ve assured him and Cassie that you’ll be in Chicago for the Bachelor party and the wedding, I’m supposed to get your measurements for your tux,” Ryan doesn’t look up because he knows that Pete will be leering at him and he’s never been able to say no to a leering Pete.

Let alone a leering Pete who had cuddled with him on the couch when he went to take an afternoon catnap in the sunlight. It’s on the tip of his tongue to ask if Ashlee knows where he is and then to remind Pete that he’s been the one cheated on in the past and will not do that to anyone else.

But Pete hasn’t made any moves towards him besides the kisses on cheeks and the cuddling, though for Pete that’s pretty much a declaration of intent.

“I’m not going,” Ryan says stubbornly. “If Jon and Cassie wanted me there they would have sent me an invitation.”

Pete snorts. “They _did_ , you left no forwarding address and it got returned to sender. Let me tell you that was fun to deal with, hysterical phone calls from Cassie wanting to know if you were alive and what was she supposed to tell Jon if you weren’t and what the hell is going on and then Spencer showing up on my doorstep with Brendon and Jon in tow demanding that I bring you home right fucking now, screw giving you space to figure out what was going on in your head.”

Ryan pushes his noodles around his plate, suddenly his appetite is gone and he can vividly picture Cassie on the phone worried, Spencer in a fury, demanding that Pete do something _now_ , because Ryan was only communicating with him, not them and that wasn’t right or fair.

He can imagine the hurt and pain that he’s caused. He doesn’t like it, this pit in his stomach that tells him that did something wrong, when all he wanted was someplace that was his, someplace that he could go to when they didn’t want him anymore.

“They don’t want me,” he says softly. He watched them reform into a threesome and he’s seen the pictures. They’re _happy_.

“Oh my god. You’re killing me here Ross,” Pete sounds upset and Ryan looks up and can see that he is, and maybe a little pissed off and Ryan doesn’t like thinking that he, maybe, caused that.

“These are your _best friends_ ; you’ve called them your brothers and your family. They love you and they miss you and they have been steadily going crazy wondering what the hell is going on in your head and how to combat it, especially since they haven’t the first clue what caused you to freak out and run away in the first place.”

“Pete…”

“I’ll go with you, you won’t be alone though. Not with them and if they ever let you leave their sight again you can come back here for peace and quiet if you want, though I’m pretty sure that you should probably put a bed in the spare bedroom, unless you want to be sharing a bed with the three of them together.”

Ryan swallows around the lump in his throat and nods.

 

******************************************************************************

 

He goes for coffee the next morning alone, Pete is wandering his house with a phone glued to his ear and he’d already been on it when Ryan got up that morning.

“You’re staying with me at a hotel,” Pete tells him as he’s leaving and he nods, silent. “Bring me back coffee.”

Mark is at the front counter and they eye each other, no one has jumped him since he got into town. He’s picked up groceries and Sandy had just handed him magazines from under the counter and asked what paintings he’d bought and then reminded him that the chips that he liked would only be on sale until Saturday so to make sure he came back and stocked up.

Colleen had a book put aside for him that he’d special ordered and they chatted for a few minutes about the show and Mark’s pleasure at it having gone so well.

He doesn’t get jumped by teen fans (or adult fans), no one treats him any different and he finds it hard to believe that Mark hadn’t gone directly home and called everyone he knew to tell them who Ryan was.

“I thought you looked familiar,” Mark says, he’s writing on his cup and setting it off to the side for the order to be filled. “But you never dressed the way that I saw in the magazines and you never put on any makeup and you didn’t act like a diva or anything, like you expected us all to bow down to you because you’d deigned to buy property in our town. So I thought, you know, everyone has a twin somewhere out there, maybe you were just one that had the same exact name or something.”

“I didn’t want people to know who I was; I just wanted to be left alone.”

Mark smiles, “I didn’t tell anyone, it’s not really any of their business if they haven’t figured it out for themselves, right?”

Ryan’s smile barely curves his lips, it’s tentative he’s sure, but he thinks that maybe Mark is telling him that he’s not going to be ratted out to the magazines or the internet.

That he’s still safe here.

“I’ll need two coffees,” he says and Mark’s grin widens.

“For Pete right? That _was_ Pete Wentz? Same as yours?”

“Yeah,” Ryan fidgets slightly. “I’ll be leaving town for a few weeks, a friend of mine is getting married and…”

Mark’s smile doesn’t dim. “Stop in and see us when you get back, we’ll want to see pictures.”

Ryan nods. “I will.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

Pete has them booked in first class for the direct flight and he gives Ryan the window, though Ryan thinks that it’s to keep him trapped in his seat and not any act of generosity.

“We’ll check in at the hotel and then you’ll call your guys and let them know you’re okay and not off slitting your wrists somewhere…” Pete is saying, he’s got one hand laying on top of Ryan’s on the arm rests.

Ryan looks out the window and thinks that he can see his cottage far off in the distance and starts counting down the days until he can come home.

 

******************************************************************************

 


	2. Chapter 2

A Life Alone - Chapter 2

 

 

Spencer is waiting at the hotel when they arrive. Sitting on the edge of a chair, hands on his knees, staring intently at the automatic door.

Ryan sees him as soon as they walk in, he stops and only Pete’s hand against his back keeps him from turning around and walking right back out again.

Spencer is pissed, his face is stony and his eyes are angry and Ryan has never dealt well with a mad Spencer. Typically he agrees to do whatever he needs to in order to make Spencer’s face not look like that.

He wonders where Brendon and Jon are, if Spencer has hidden them out of a view somewhere, and if they’ll leap out at him at any moment looking just as angry.

Spencer stands as Pete’s hand directs Ryan in his direction. His feet are moving of their own volition, if he had any control over them they’d be walking in the _opposite_ direction.

Ryan has no clue what expression is on his face, but he figures that it must be some form of terror, because Spencer’s face softens slightly and when he’s within a few steps Spencer walks forward to meet them and grabs onto him.

Pulling him into hug and Ryan doesn’t know what to do, how to respond. It takes him a few seconds before he returns it.

Spencer holding on tight, Pete’s hand a steadying presence against his back and Ryan lays his head on Spencer’s shoulder and breathes.

He wants to go home.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Spencer doesn’t let him go, he keeps one hand on him at all times, like he’s afraid if he’s not touching him that Ryan will disappear into a puff of smoke.

“I told you they were worried about you,” Pete whispers in his ear, then goes to check them in.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Pete gets them one room, with one bed. Ryan would argue but he really doesn’t have the energy at this point.

“It’s all they had,” he says and Ryan knows he’s lying.

Spencer’s eyes narrow slightly when he realizes what Pete has done. He shoots a look at Ryan that he can’t decipher and Ryan wonders when Spencer became someone that he couldn’t read.

He doesn’t think that it’s fair that they’re forcing him to deal with Pete (who is acting like they are something they aren’t anymore) and Spencer (who is both worried and angry and can’t seem to settle on one emotion at a time) at the same time.

Ryan longs for the peace and solitude of his cottage.

 

******************************************************************************

 

They walk through the door and Pete lets Hemmy out of his carrier as Spencer closes the door behind them.

Ryan stands in the middle of the room and stares at the floor.

He thought he’d have time to figure out how he was going to deal with Spencer and Brendon and Jon. What he was going to say to them, how he was going to convince them that he was fine with the break-up.

He thinks he finally has the ‘why, why, why’s’ under control.

He wonders if Pete had called Spencer to meet them, Pete had said that he could make the call himself, but maybe Pete hadn’t trusted him to actually do so.

“You said you were getting in today, there’s only one hotel you stay at when you’re in the city,” Spencer is saying and Ryan thinks he maybe missed Pete asking a question because Spencer sounds defensive. “I figured if I waited long enough you’d show up.”

“I was going to call,” Ryan says quietly, he’s still staring at the floor. It’s a nice off-white carpet; he thinks this color would look very nice in his living room. Right now there is a red/beige/green monstrosity in there. He hasn’t gotten around to replacing it, but when he gets home, he decides, that is his first project.

“Well you also said that you’d come back to Chicago when you were done in Vegas and LA, so sue me if I didn’t want to wait and see if you’d actually contact us when you got here,” Spencer mutters pissily.

Ryan doesn’t look up at him; he doesn’t know what to say. There is silence and it isn’t the comfortable silence that he and Pete used to fall into at the cottage.

This is an uncomfortable silence and he knows that each one of them is waiting for one of the others to say something.

Pete clears his throat and Ryan looks, sideways, over at him.

“I’m going to go wash my hands,” he touches Ryan’s back gently when he passes by, the door closes and Ryan and Spencer are alone in the room.

“Ryan…” Spencer starts and stops, Ryan knows that if he looks up Spencer will be dragging a hand through his hair in agitation.

“It’s okay, I’m… I understand, its okay,” Ryan says softly.

He doesn’t, not really.

And its not, but the decision has already been made so it’s not like he has a choice in the matter.

He can’t read Spencer any more, maybe Spencer can’t read him either, so it’s possible that Spencer won’t realize that he’s lying about it being okay.

Spencer sighs and he feels hands on his face, tilting his head up so he’s forced to meet Spencer’s eyes head on.

Spencer looks sad.

“Maybe you can explain it to me then, because _I don’t_ understand.”

“The break,” Ryan explains, he doesn’t want to be looking at Spencer when he says the words, he doesn’t think that he can be strong about this if Spencer is staring at him. “I understand.”

“Ryan,” Spencer shakes his head, he looks confused.

“I won’t fight the break-up, I told Pete I wouldn’t. So, it’s…” he takes a deep breath and doesn’t bite his lip or fidget or look away, Spencer had told him in the past that those were all tells for when he was lying or about to lie. “It’s okay.”

Spencer shakes his head, his face has dissolved into an expression that Ryan doesn’t know, it looks equal parts fear and something else. Ryan doesn’t know what Spencer is afraid of; Ryan has said that it was okay, that they didn’t have to hide what the break was really leading into from him anymore.

“We’re not breaking up,” Spencer says firmly, his hands are gripping Ryan’s face, forcing eye contact still and he wonders if he will have bruises when Spencer finally lets him go.

“Spence…”

“We’re not breaking up, we’re not breaking up. I don’t know who told you that, but we’re not,” Spencer is saying it over and over again, like he thinks that if says it often enough Ryan will believe him.

He wants to, he really does. But the decisions made for him, the secrets they kept from him… he doesn’t know if he can.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Spencer has left, he has said that he will return with Brendon and Jon in tow later that day and Ryan is taking the time to regroup.

He knows that Spencer knows that he doesn’t believe him.

“Where’s your sidekick?” Pete asks, he’s lounging on the bed and he’s had his glued to his ear for what seems like hours. Ryan thinks that the rest of Fall Out Boy will be in town at some point, Pete had said something about a concert when he was on the phone.

Patrick has a very loud voice when he wants to and Pete had gotten very defensive over the implication that he’d miss a show.

“It’s in a box in my hallway closet,” Ryan says. He doesn’t miss it; he didn’t think he’d ever get to the point where he wasn’t reaching for it every day, but it seems he has.

He has no one to call, no one to text. Though he should, maybe, call Mark and let him know that he got out of town okay and when to expect him to return.

Ryan hopes soon.

Pete hmms at him. “You probably have about fifty thousand voice mails waiting.”

“I’m pretty sure that my voice mail can’t hold that many messages,” Ryan says, then asks, “How many of them are from you?”

“About forty-nine thousand five hundred or so,” Ryan wants to smile, he would have thought that _all_ the voice mails would be from Pete. That had been their main form of communication for years.

Phone calls and text messages and e-mails.

This has been the longest time they’ve spent together in one room or place since Pete had ended them.

Pete is staring at him and Ryan shifts on the chair, he has his knees drawn up to his chest, arms wrapped around them, chin settled in the V created by them.

He’s tired and just wants to go to sleep, but Pete has already claimed the bed and is sprawling across it. Ryan wonders if he’s just supposed to accept the fact that he and Pete will be sharing a bed or if Pete has secret plans to have Spencer and Brendon and Jon take him home with them.

“Come cuddle with me Ryan Ross,” Pete says, it’s an order and it only takes Ryan a minute (where he blinks at Pete who just stares back at him with an arched brow) to get up and walk the few steps to the bed.

He doesn’t know what Pete wants from him, doesn’t know why Pete is staying with him when he should be making tracks back to Los Angeles and Ashlee and leaving him in the others hands.

He stands at the end of the bed and wonders what he’s doing; this is in no way intelligent, this was how he got burned by Pete in the first place.

Pete pats the bed and looks at him expectantly; Ryan sighs, then climbs onto it next to him, settling on his back and staring at the ceiling.

Pete tugs him closer, rolling him onto his side so Ryan is facing him. Hand against his hip, a leg thrown over his, Ryan relaxes slightly and Pete moves so that their foreheads are touching.

Ryan’s eyes close, he’s so _very_ tired suddenly.

“I’m tired,” he murmurs. Pete hums at him and rolls onto his back, taking Ryan with him; he ends up sprawled half across Pete’s chest, head resting on his shoulder. It’s comfortable and familiar and won’t last; the good things that he gets don’t ever seem to.

He still has to bite his lip to keep from begging Pete to never leave him again. It’s a protective measure, Pete has been with Ashlee long enough that Ryan doesn’t see them parting ways any time soon and he won’t hand Pete weapons that can be wielded against him.

Besides, being alone is not _so_ horrible.

In the few short weeks that he’d managed it, he’d accomplished more then he had in months.

Pete’s lips brush his forehead and Ryan shivers, reminds himself that Pete is not _his_ anymore, that he can’t tilt his head and press kisses to Pete’s lips until he returns them. Pete is only offering comfort and companionship until Ryan can accept it from the guys… or is allowed to go home, alone.

“Go to sleep Ryan,” he murmurs against Ryan’s skin. “I’ll be here when you wake up.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

He’s alone and it’s dark when he finally opens his eyes. His fingers are twitching and words are clamoring to get out. His laptop is in the living room and Ryan thinks that, if Pete doesn’t intrude or ask questions, he might be able to get a few chapters done.

He can’t hear Pete moving around and he’s not clinging to the edge of the bed so Ryan knows that he’s not in the bedroom any longer.

So much for his promise that he’d be there when Ryan woke up.

“Feel better?”

Ryan sits up, heart racing. His eyes search the room and he sees Jon sitting in the chair that he’d been huddled in earlier, before Pete had commanded him to cuddle with him on the bed and he’d fallen asleep.

He looks tired and relieved and Cassie has done what Ryan had thought was going to be an impossibility; she has gotten a razor near Jon’s face and wielded scissors on his hair, because he looks trimmed and neat, he in no way resembles the homeless person that he’d been when Ryan had left.

“Jon,” Ryan says, he presses a hand to his chest. “Where’s…”

“Pete took Spencer and Brendon downstairs so that the raised voices wouldn’t wake you up,” Jon says, he stands and walks over to the bed, sitting down next to Ryan. There are a few inches between them, months ago there wouldn’t have been any space and Brendon would have flung himself across their laps while Spencer fell on the floor laughing.

“Why is Pete yelling at Spencer and Brendon?” Ryan’s hands twist together in his lap and he stares at them as if they are fascinating.

“It’s more like Spencer and Brendon are yelling at Pete,” Jon sighs, then lays a hand over Ryan’s hands, stilling their restless movements.

Ryan looks over at him, puzzled.

“They think Pete is taking advantage of the situation and you.”

Ryan shakes his head. “He’s not.” That’s the one thing he knows for sure, that Pete is not taking advantage. Ryan knows taking advantage, the second time that they’d ever met Pete had taken advantage of the fact that Ryan had heart-shaped eyes and a crush the size of the world.

“They want you to come stay with them, they’re renting a little two bedroom, the spare has been set aside as your room since they got it,” Jon is saying.

“I would rather stay here,” Ryan says softly but firmly.

He won’t stay with Spencer and Brendon, if he did he’d be forced to watch them interact and be together and while he thinks he’s doing okay with the _concept_ of the two of them being together… he doesn’t think he’s really ready for the _reality_ of them being together.

Being in their space and hearing them and seeing them… he’d be forced to _see_ the reality, that they want each other and no one wants him and no, he’s not ready for that.

“You’re staying in a hotel room, with one bed, with Pete Wentz,” Jon says. He’s looking at Ryan like he wants to be saying something else.

Like calling him three kinds of a fool and reminding him that Pete had broken his heart and maybe calling him a hypocrite.

Ryan wants to remind him that Pete is with Ashlee and Ryan won’t ever be the other ‘woman’.

“If he gets too handsy I can sleep in the tub,” Ryan says, “Put a blanket and a pillow in it and they’re not actually all that uncomfortable.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

Pete, Spencer and Brendon return after Ryan and Jon have given up waiting on them and ordered room service.

They all look subdued, even Brendon and Ryan and Jon exchange a look.

Ryan nibbles on the end of a french fry and watches them all with interested eyes.

Pete is kneeling besides his chair to pet Hemmy, Hemmy has stopped begging with his large, round eyes for handouts from Ryan’s plate and is instead soaking up the attention Pete is lavishing on him.

Spencer is standing in the middle of the room looking frustrated and Brendon has flung himself down on the sofa and no one is saying a word but Pete, and he’s telling Hemmy that ‘he’s such a good boy’ so Ryan isn’t sure that counts.

A phone rings and everyone but Ryan reaches for their sidekicks, Ryan leans back in his chair and picks up his water, taking a sip.

Pete frowns at his phone, “I’ll take it in the other room,” he says. He shuts the door behind him and Brendon looks like he wants to go press his ear to the door and eavesdrop.

He doesn’t, he and Spencer exchange a look instead and Ryan puts his water glass down and picks up another french fry to nibble on.

He’s not really hungry, but Jon had insisted that he needed to eat something.

“We were thinking…” Brendon starts. “That you could come stay with Spencer and me.”

“I think I’d rather stay here,” Ryan says, just as softly and just as firmly as he’d told Jon.

He knows that Brendon and Spencer are together, he’s happy for them because of it. He is.

If he tells himself that often enough he’s pretty sure he’ll believe it eventually.

He’s happy for them, so he doesn’t see why he needs to have a front row seat to their relationship; he wants to tell them that it’s a cruel punishment to be forced to see the things that he can’t have any longer, but he’s managed to keep this particular secret so well that neither one of them have any clue that he maybe, possibly, had a crush on Brendon at one point.

“I think that’s a bad idea,” Spencer says. Jon hums an agreement and Brendon is shaking his head so fiercely that Ryan is afraid that it might fall off if he doesn’t stop.

“Why?” he asks. And he honestly has no clue why everyone is so dead set against him staying here with Pete, even Patrick, when Pete had called him earlier, had proclaimed loudly enough that Ryan could _hear_ him, that Pete was a moron and an idiot and told him that he was just asking for trouble.

Pete is being a bit more attentive to him then usual, yeah, but not enough that Ryan thought it warranted this amount of disagreement from everyone.

If Pete _really_ wanted Ryan in his bed, he could have him there, naked and willing in under thirty seconds. He’d done it before and Ryan had gone readily enough, it was only later, when Pete had dismissed him and gone back to whomever his girl of the week was… well that was when Ryan would wonder what the hell had happened and why Pete Wentz still had that kind of power over him and vow to not do that again.

The three exchange looks, they have a whole silent conversation that doesn’t include Ryan and there’s a knot in his throat that is reminding him that they don’t _need_ him anymore. They function as a group and he isn’t sure they even realize that they aren’t including him.

He stares at his plate and pushes his fries around with a finger.

He’s suddenly tired again, even though he’s slept a good portion of the day away with Pete next to him and he wants to kick Pete and his mysterious phone call out of the bedroom so he can curl up in bed and remind himself that he doesn’t _mind_ being alone and look how much writing he’s gotten _done_ without the interruptions of having other people around.

“Pete, maybe, has ulterior motives for having you guys confined to one room, with one bed,” Spencer states.

Ryan laughs harshly and doesn’t look up. He doesn’t know if the concern that he might or might not see there will be genuine, if he looks up he might see it and if he sees it he might be able to tell that they just don’t care and are trying to sound like they do.

“I can take care of myself,” he says, he doesn’t know what he sounds like, he thinks he sounds normal, confident, but when he looks up Brendon is wincing and Spencer is frowning.

“We’re not saying you can’t,” Jon says. “It’s just…”

“Besides you guys should know me well enough to know that I won’t be that ‘other guy’, Pete is happy and I’m happy for him and I’m not going to do anything to jeopardize his relationship with Ashlee.”

“Pete and Ashlee have broken up,” Brendon says, his tone is screaming that this is information that Ryan should already know. “It’s been all over the papers, we heard about it after the fact, but Patrick says they got into some huge screaming match backstage at one of their shows when Pete said that he was going to get you and drag you home.”

Ryan blinks at him.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Ryan has to promise four times to meet them in the hotel restaurant for breakfast before they’ll leave.

Pete comes out of the bedroom when the door shuts, glaring at his phone.

“I’m not going to be rebound boy,” Ryan says. He picks a fry off his plate, then puts it back down, they’re ice cold and he’s not hungry anyway. He just needs something to do with his hands.

“They told you then.”

“That you and Ashlee had a public screaming match and broke up? Yeah,” he makes a face. “If you go back to L.A. you could probably salvage it.”

“She threw things at me and called you… well a lot of vicious names that really don’t matter and certainly aren’t true. So maybe I don’t want to,” he sits down on the couch, sets his sidekick on the end table and helps Hemmy climb up onto the couch and into his lap.

Ryan laughs, he doesn’t think that it sounds bitter but he can’t be sure. “I’m still a guy, Pete, all those things you said when you told me that we couldn’t see each other ‘that way’ anymore? They’re all still true. I’m still male and in the public eye and so are you. You still want to have a successful band and not have Patrick throw things at you for making stupid decisions.”

“Maybe I’ve come to the realization that we can have whatever we want and screw what everyone else thinks.”

He walks over to the couch and leans down to kiss the top of Pete’s head, it’s a risky move but he manages to draw back before Pete can grab him and pull him down into his lap.

“Like I said, I won’t be rebound boy. Write a couple of songs about it, go bang a few groupies at your next concert,” Ryan straightens, drags a hand through his hair. “Maybe try being alone for a while, it’s actually not all that bad.”

“Ryan…”

“I’m going to bed; I’ll talk to you in the morning.”

Ryan walks out of the living room, closes the door to the bedroom and changes for bed.

Pete doesn’t come in; Ryan doesn’t allow himself to think about the fact that he’s disappointed in that.

 

******************************************************************************

 

They sit, the four of them, around a table, in a closed off, private room and Ryan has already mapped out the two accessible exits and a window that can be used as one if he gets desperate enough.

Ryan wonders if they got the circular table so that everyone could sit an equal distance apart and not look like they were taking sides or ganging up on him.

Jon is staring at his menu as if it might offer him the secrets to eternal life and happiness.

Brendon and Spencer are taking turns staring at him, then having silent conversations, where they blink at each other and their lips twitch but no sound is made.

Ryan has already decided what he’s having, and is slouching, slightly in his chair, staring at a space on the wall directly between Spencer and Brendon’s shoulders.

He hopes that it looks as if he’s looking at them, but means that he doesn’t actually have to make eye contact with them.

Brendon clears his throat and Jon puts the menu down.

“Have you been doing any writing?” Brendon asks.

“Yes.”

“Anything that we can see?” Spencer asks.

“No.”

Spencer looks frustrated at the monosyllable answers; Brendon looks as if he wants to throw things. Only Jon looks like he isn’t three seconds from hitting something, but Jon normally looks calm and collected even when he wants to throttle Brendon for singing Disney songs for hours on end.

He doesn’t know what they want from him, they aren’t a band anymore (even if they haven’t said the words to him yet), why would he share his words with people that aren’t interested in singing them or playing the music for them?

“Ryan…” Jon starts.

“I don’t know what you want from me,” Ryan says. His voice doesn’t tremble or shake, he doesn’t sound like he’s going to have a breakdown at the table. He’s proud of himself.

“I told Spencer that it was okay,” Ryan says. “I don’t know what else you want from me.”

Spencer shakes his head and Jon just hangs his, he’d probably be banging it on the table if there wasn’t a plate and his coffee cup in the way.

“Maybe we want you to realize that we’re _not breaking up_ , that we have, in no way, shape or form, indicated that we were even _planning_ to think up breaking up,” Brendon states firmly, quietly, his eyes locked on Ryan’s.

Ryan stares at him.

“You decided to take a break,” Ryan says slowly.

“Yes, we know that.”

“ _You_ decided to take a break, you never asked for my input on that matter, it was never discussed with me prior to the three of you _telling_ me that we were taking a break,” Ryan stands up slowly. He’s not hungry, not anymore.

“Ryan,” Spencer stands, is around the table and gripping his arms tightly before he has time to take a step back.

“You cut me out of my band, you didn’t…” he shakes his head, he can’t tell them that they made him feel like an outsider, that they made him feel like he was going to be left all alone with no friends and no band and nothing.

He won’t give them that type of power over him, even though they already have it and all they have to do is look at him to see it.

“I’ll do whatever you want me to do,” Ryan says, he doesn’t try to pull away, even though he wants to. He wants to go back to the room and hide from Pete and whatever his intentions are and count down the days until he can go home.

Spencer has a strong grip, a drummers grip, unless Spencer lets go of him he knows he won’t break free of it. If he can just get them to tell him what they _want_ , then Spencer will let him go, “Just tell me what you _want_ from me.”

“We _want_ you to believe that we’re not breaking up, because we’re not. And if we ever make that decision we want you to believe that we’ll sit down, _the four of us_ , and we’ll make it _together_ , as a _group_ ,” Spencer says, he’s gripping Ryan’s arms tight, staring at him intently with desperate eyes.

Like this is the most important thing that he has to say, like Ryan _believing_ him when he says it is the most important thing to him.

Ryan stares at him… and hopes that he’s not a fool.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Pete is sitting on the couch watching the door when Ryan walks back through it. He feels like he’s gone through a war, like he’s been through hell and back and he hopes that they’re not trying to make him an idiot for trusting their words.

He _wants_ to believe the words (he puts a lot of faith in words, they’re the way that he communicates almost all of the emotions that he can’t display otherwise), _hopes_ that he can trust that they didn’t _mean_ to cut him off (they sound sincere enough, he wants to believe them), because like Pete has said…

These are his brothers, his best friends.

He doesn’t want to think that family could have that careless a disregard for one of their members. He pointedly doesn’t think about his father.

That’s done, after all, finished. The words are out and his father is buried and there’s no use in beating a dead horse.

“Okay?” Pete asks, he’s watching him carefully as Ryan closes the door. He sits on the opposite end of the couch, a distance of a whole person between them. Ryan thinks that person resembles Ashlee or maybe Patrick.

Somebody disapproving, because the space remains, even though Pete is staring at him like he’d like nothing more then to drag him that distance of a person closer.

“I think that maybe you were right,” Ryan says calmly. Pete snorts.

“On what subject? The one about you jumping to conclusions and thinking your band was going to break up without telling you?”

Ryan glares at him.

“Yes.”

“So… what’s the plan Ryan Ross?”

“The plan,” Ryan repeats. “I’m staying for the wedding, I have fittings tomorrow, Jon will pick me up for them first thing in the morning. I’m having dinner with him and Cassie,” he glances over at Pete, whose face is now impassive.

Ryan has no clue what he’s thinking.

“You are invited, provided that you can keep your hands to yourself for the entire evening. Jon has reserved the right to shoot you if you attempt to sully my virtue,” Pete snorts another laugh and covers his mouth with his hand when Ryan glares at him again.

“When the wedding is over we’ll still be on break and I’m going to be allowed to go home.”

“By home, I’m thinking _they_ think you’re going to Vegas or L.A. and in actuality you’re going back to your cottage in the middle of the ass-end of nowhere.”

“That was really not clarified, and I really wish you would stop saying that,” Ryan sighs.

“I think you underestimate your guys, they’re not letting you out of their sight for a really long time. You might think that you’re going to your cottage in the…” Pete cuts off when Ryan glares again, “boondocks alone, I think you should really get moving on getting a bed in the spare bedroom.”

“Pete…”

“I just think four people in your bed is going to be a tight squeeze, there’s barely enough room for the two of us,” Pete leers and Ryan sighs. Because just like that the space of that invisible disapproving person vanishes and Pete slides across the couch towards him, grabby hands pulling him into a cuddle on the couch and he doesn’t have the energy to shove Pete off.

Not after dealing with Spencer and Brendon and Jon all morning.

“Rebound boy,” Ryan reminds him, voice muffled by Pete’s shoulder. He’ll have to have stern talk with his arms later, because they’re locked around Pete’s body.

Pete grips him tighter. “You’re not rebound boy, not by a long shot,” he whispers in Ryan’s ear.

Ryan hopes these words are something else he can believe in, and not something else that will come back and bite him in the ass later.

He closes his eyes and buries his head in Pete’s neck and forcefully relaxes every tense muscle in his body.

And lets Pete hold him tight and together.

 

 

******************************************************************************

 


	3. Chapter 3

**A Life Alone - Part 3**

 

 

Dinner with Jon and Cassie is just him and Pete, Ryan is kind of surprised. He'd thought they would bombard him with 'group' time until he was ready to scream.

Or beg Pete to be allowed to go home.

The others don't know where his cottage is, not yet. Not unless Pete has sold him out, which Ryan doesn't think he has. He is still maintaining the thought that Pete likes being the only one knowing where Ryan goes when he's not with them.

Pete tries to attack him with eyeliner before they leave; Ryan manages to evade him long enough that they'll be late if they dawdle any longer.

He doesn't want to know what Jon will think if they're late, the guys already think that Pete is attempting to lure him back into his bed. Of course Ryan is leaning toward that as well, he thinks that maybe it says something that Ryan isn't already there, like maybe Ryan has grown up a little bit, that maybe he knows something about his self-worth that his eighteen year-old self hadn't.

Cassie answers the door when he knocks, Pete is standing very close behind him, his hand is low on Ryan's back, any lower and he would be groping him on Jon and Cassie's porch.

"Ryan," Cassie sounds happy to see him, relieved. She pulls him away from Pete's wandering hands and into a tight hug.

He doesn't think they've ever been close enough where a hug is a suitable greeting, though he returns it awkwardly.

Behind her shoulder he can see Jon rolling his eyes.

"She's just relieved that she doesn't have to figure out someone who could be the third best man or decide which of her bridesmaids can be cut," he says, Ryan smirks, quickly wiping it from his face when Cassie releases him to whirl on Jon.

"Or it could be that I was actually worried about him Jonathan, and am relieved to see him whole and in one piece," she snaps, it's good humored, not angry. Ryan shifts on his feet and Pete steps up next to him. Shutting the door behind him.

"I don't get a hug?" Pete asks, his hand is back on Ryan's back, he thinks it might actually be lower then it was when Ryan had knocked on the door.

"The least you could have done was take one of them with you," Cassie says, she's still glaring at Jon. "Do you know how difficult they were to deal with after you took off on your own and then didn't even tell them where you were going? Like little children all of you, fighting over the same toy."

Ryan tilts his head and squints at her. He thinks she's referring to him as a toy, or maybe a child… he's not really sure, but he thinks he might need to be offended on his behalf.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Dinner is calm, there are no raised voices, no shouting. Nobody telling Ryan that he's crazy.

Cassie sits him and Pete on opposite sides of the table when she realizes that Pete is about a hands span away from getting fresh with Ryan right in front of Jon.

"I wouldn't normally care," she confides when she has Ryan help bring in the casserole and bread. "Because it would be a great show to see you smack his hands or punch him, but I think Jon would also try to defend your honor and I really need him to not be bruised for the wedding pictures."

He wants to tell her that she has nothing to worry about, but he doesn't think he can say that with a straight face or that he even believes it anymore.

He might be proving Jon right and sleeping in the tub with a blanket and pillow once they get back to the hotel.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Patrick and rest of Fall Out Boy descend days later. After Ryan has resorted to wearing his headphones when he writes, because Pete doesn't like being ignored and if he thinks Ryan is just sitting there and not paying attention to him he goes out of his way to be as annoying as possible.

Ryan realizes they're in town when his stomach starts growling loud enough that he can hear it even with the headphones on, he's pulling them off and wondering why Pete didn't tap him on the shoulder to remind him to eat when he looks up and sees Patrick is sitting across from him.

Ryan blinks at him, and wonders how long he's been sitting there.

He looks not pissed off, not overly friendly, Ryan doesn't know Patrick well enough to read the nuances of his expressions, he looks around the room and doesn't see Pete or any of the others.

"Joe took Pete and Andy for coffee and food," Patrick says, Ryan wonders if he can read minds and really hopes not.

"Why didn't you just tap me on the shoulder or something?" Ryan asks. He would have known it wasn't Pete, Pete had been just pretty much climbing into his lap or sending Hemmy over to sit on his feet when he felt Ryan had wrote long enough.

"I didn't want to interrupt, you looked like you were pretty engrossed in what you were doing… what are you working on?"

Ryan looks down at the desk, rubs at a scuff mark and hopes its not from his laptop, he's going in half on the room with Pete whether he wants him to or not.

"I'm writing a book," he says quietly. Everyone knows, Pete had figured it out days prior when Spencer must have told him that Ryan wasn't working on any new songs when he sat for hours in front of the computer.

He doesn't look up because he doesn't want to see Patrick's skeptical look, the one that means that he can't pull this off and everyone knows it so why is he even bothering.

"I'm more then halfway done," he adds. And he is, he'd looked at the brief outline that he'd typed up when he'd first started writing, he's made some minor changes since then; a love interest for the main hero, a few friends that hadn't been there before.

"That's good," Patrick's voice is gentle, quiet and Ryan hazards a look up and sees Patrick looking at him with an expression that Ryan can't put a name to.

"Pete says that you're planning on going back to wherever he found you after the wedding?"

Ryan nods. "It was our agreement."

"Do Spencer and the others know that?" Patrick asks, he's slouching back in his chair now. Getting comfortable.

"I don't know what Pete told them," Ryan shrugs. He's trying, he really is. He had dinner with Spencer and Brendon and only had to leave the table twice when they were being overly couple-ish

He's had dinner with Jon and Cassie and he's ate alone with Pete, he and Pete have come to an agreement about the fact that there is only one bed and as long as Pete doesn't attempt to grope him while they're sleeping Ryan is okay with sharing that bed with Pete.

He doesn't admit it, not to himself, not to anyone out loud.

But he kind of likes waking up in the morning with Pete wrapped around him.

It's bittersweet though, and he's trying not to get used to this opportunity to touch one of the things that he's always wanted (Pete focused solely and completely on him, waking up in the morning with Pete still with him) because he knows that when he goes home it'll be gone again.

Pete will go grovel at Ashlee's feet and convince her to take him back or maybe its Jeanae's turn once more, he's not sure, he tries not to keep track of Pete's love life.

He just knows that it's not his, that Pete made that decision and he'll eventually remember why he made it and Ryan doesn't want his heart as damaged as it was back then.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Pete and the others return with food and Ryan tries not to feel like the odd man out with the entirety of Fall Out Boy sitting in a circle on the floor with him eating dinner.

He feels young, like a kid that's being allowed to eat at the grownup table, even if that table is a span of carpet in a hotel room.

Because while Pete is leering at him every so often, glaring defiantly at Patrick when he rests a hand on Ryan's knee… Patrick keeps reminding him to eat and Joe keeps putting food on his plate.

"When's your concert?" Ryan asks, when Andy takes a break from his attempt to convert Ryan to veganism. He'd tried, once, it wasn't really his thing.

"Tomorrow night," Patrick says.

"You'll come on stage with us," Pete announces.

"I will?" Ryan asks at the same time as Patrick's, "he will?"

"Well he's here, we're here. It's kismet, fate," Pete grins widely, Ryan narrows his eyes and doesn't trust it.

"You're afraid that I'm going to sneak off when you're on stage and either get my own room or go home."

"I'm not afraid of any such thing."

Patrick snorts and Joe snickers into his hand, Andy just rolls his eyes.

"I promised Jon that I would stay for the wedding," Ryan says. "I'm not going back on that now that I've been measured for the tux and everything. Do you know how painful an experience that was? I got stuck with pins four times and had to keep telling the guy who was fitting me that I didn't want rosettes on the cummerbund and that if he tried to put me in pink I was killing him."

"Jon thought it was all quite amusing," Pete nods. "Though he was disappointed that you vetoed the rosettes and wouldn't even contemplate lace."

 

******************************************************************************

 

The wedding is small, intimate and beautiful. It's exactly what Jon and Cassie wanted so Ryan is happy for them.

Jon entrusts Ryan with his camera for the day and he takes roll after roll of pictures when he isn't being tasked with various duties as one of Jon's three best men.

He only notices that Ashlee is there when she steps right in front of him and he almost runs into her, Jon and Cassie are being sweet up on the dais and he'd wanted to get a good picture of it.

He instead wraps his arms around the camera to protect it just in case Ashlee decides to get violent.

She's staring at him and he's fidgeting and wondering where the half a dozen people that he under normal circumstances can't get rid of have vanished off to.

"I don't know what your game is," she says finally, "but you've managed to fool them all into thinking you're some delicate flower that needs to be protected."

"I don't know what you're talking about," Ryan says, because he doesn't. He thinks Ashlee might be insane, it's probably what drew Pete to her in the first place, Pete seems to like people that have a few screws loose.

He pointedly doesn't think about what that says about him.

He hopes she doesn't get violent and ruin Jon and Cassie's day, and then wonders why she's there in the first place if she and Pete have broken up.

She smiles at him, it's a thin and not nice smile, Ryan doesn't return it because he thinks that she might be contemplating ways to murder him and make it look like an accident.

She turns and walks away and Patrick appears at his shoulder right after she takes four steps.

"What's she doing here?" he wonders, Ryan shrugs.

"Contemplating murder?"

 

******************************************************************************

 

Ashlee doesn't approach him again, kept back by Patrick, who's hovering at Ryan's shoulder and glaring at her when she looks like she's going to walk up to him again.

She doesn't approach Pete either, he doesn't have anyone at his shoulder but Ryan doesn't think he needs to with the expression on his face whenever she looks like she's going to sidle up alongside him.

Ryan wonders again what exactly had been said (or shouted as the case may be) to cause this level of animosity between her and Pete and rest of the guys.

This isn't just because of him, it can't be.

There's something else going on here that he can't put his finger on, maybe because he doesn't have all the facts and no one will tell him what those facts are when he asks.

She stays on the far side of the room and she watches them and Ryan's not sure what she's hoping to accomplish by coming into what should be enemy territory for her.

"I sent her an invitation," Cassie appears at his elbow. "Back when she and Pete were still together."

"Has she even offered her congratulations to you and Jon yet?" Ryan asks, he's been watching and he doesn't think she's even once approached the newlyweds.

"I think she's too busy imagining ways to torture and destroy you," Jon says, his arms loops around Cassie's waist and Ryan doesn't look envious but only because he's really happy for them.

 

******************************************************************************

 

He goes back to the room alone; Pete had been talking to Patrick, heads bent close together.

His bags were packed that morning when Pete had been distracted by, what Ryan now assumes were phone calls warning of Ashlee's imminent arrival. All he has to do now is grab them and go.

It feels too easy.

He has his plane ticket booked already, accomplished during one of the few ten minutes spans where Pete left him alone, he probably paid much more then he should have but he doesn't care.

For days that overpriced plane ticket has been his symbol of freedom.

Of peace and quiet.

Jon has his address in his coat pocket, slipped in there by Ryan's hand when Jon had taken it off to go dance with Cassie, there's a note there asking for copies of the pictures, along with his address.

He's not trying to hide, doesn't want to feel as if he's afraid of his family.

His phone number is there as well and he hopes that they call and warn him when they get ready to descend upon him.

He leaves the keycard on the desk and takes a quick look around the room to make sure that he hasn't forgotten anything.

His laptop is over his shoulder and his bag is on the floor by the door where he'd left it, he feels like he's running away and he squashes that emotion.

He'd told them, that once the wedding was done, that he was going home.

Alone.

And he is.

 

******************************************************************************

 

He doesn't breathe again until he walks through his front door, he'd been so sure that someone would figure out what he was doing and that he'd be caught at the airport or in the lobby, or just _caught_ before he could escape.

No one had, he thinks that he's been so concerned about someone stopping him from going home when he should have been more concerned about how he was getting there.

He's been traveling for hours, he probably should have played closer attention to the ticket itinerary, because instead of the straight shot that he'd had when he'd traveled with Pete, he'd had two layovers that had felt like forever.

He puts his bags down by the door and stretches.

"Jesus Ryan, did you take the most indirect route that you could find?" he hears and he doesn't jump. Just closes his eyes and leans against the door.

Pete appears in the doorway leading to the living room, he's in sleep pants and he isn't wearing a t-shirt, Hemmy appears by his bare feet after a second.

"Pete," he says with resignation. He guesses that it's better then Spencer and Brendon appearing suddenly.

"You're not getting rid of me that easily, I thought you would have figured that out by now."

 

******************************************************************************

 

Pete had allowed him to shower and change, clean out his bag and start a load of laundry (Ryan pretends not to notice Pete tossing his whites in alongside his) before he'd pulled him down on the couch alongside him.

Right now he's holding him loosely, Ryan could move if he wanted to, instead he's letting his head rest on Pete's shoulder and dozing.

"I ordered a bed for the spare room," Pete says quietly, Ryan stiffens slightly at the presumption that Pete could make decisions as to what is going in rooms in _his_ house.

"Brendon and Spencer will be here in a few days, they booked their tickets before you took off from the wedding reception, thus proving, that in this, I know you _better_ then they do," Ryan tries to ignore the self-satisfaction, the glee in Pete's tone.

"Pete…" Ryan starts, he shifts and Pete's grip tightens.

"They just want to see, Ryan, to make sure that you're okay here," Pete says softly. "It's only for a few days."

"Are you leaving when they do?"

Pete sighs, breath puffing against his ear. "I'm not leaving until you kick me out."

"You have your own house," Ryan reminds him. "It's like four times the size of mine."

"And yet in your house, in your town, I was able to stop for coffee and not get mobbed by the teenies waiting alongside me for theirs. I like it here."

Ryan wonders if there was a town meeting held to tell everyone who he was and who might be coming through town in order to visit him.

He wonders if he should ask for a transcript from Mark to make sure that no one was missed and that a petition to force him out hasn't been started.

 

******************************************************************************

 

The bed is delivered two days later, Ryan has spent those two days figuring out where the stuff that remains in boxes in the spare room needs to go so that there is floor space in which to place the bed.

While he's busy in the spare bedroom organizing, Pete has been busy in the living room redecorating.

His desk has been moved in there, in front of the window overlooking his backyard.

He wonders why he didn't think of placing it there, it has perfect light and is sunny and cheerful.

It's also really distracting; he spends an hour one afternoon watching Pete watching Hemmy chase leaves across the yard instead of writing.

Pete sleeps with him in his bed at night, an arm tossed casually over his chest, leg laying over his. He's not pressing for anything, though he has started laying kisses along the back of Ryan's neck when he passes by him, which he does frequently.

Ryan decides this is Pete's way of acclimatizing Ryan to his presence once more, but he can't figure out why Pete is moving so slow and he wants to tell Pete that he doesn't need to acclimatize him.

Ryan had thought he knew all Pete's moves but these ones are unfamiliar and they feel old and clunky and a lot like old-fashioned courting…

It's nice, he writes a whole chapter one night (going horribly off outline for the second time since he started his story) about the man that is wooing the hero; an old lover that has suddenly descended once more in the hopes of regaining what they'd thought lost.

Ryan contemplates cutting it out, it feels nonsensical, but it also feels like a part of the whole journey the hero is taking, so he leaves it.

Ryan thinks that a year ago Pete would have already had Ryan naked and willing in his bed, lack of desire had never been their problem and still isn't.

Because he's woken up every morning since Pete first came to his little cottage feeling Pete pressed against his leg.

He just can't figure out why Pete hasn't done anything, before he would snap his fingers and blink, maybe wink and Ryan would be ready and willing.

Now it feels like he's waiting and Ryan can't figure out for what.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Brendon and Spencer arrive the day that Ryan finishes his book.

He's made amazing progress since he returned home; the words flowing from his fingers almost faster then he can type them.

When he types 'The End' and saves it for the last time it hurts a little. He's finished it and he's not sure what he'll do with all his time now that he's done.

For now, he closes the document, shuts his laptop down and stretches.

He can see Pete laying on his back in the yard, Hemmy is sprawled next to his legs and Ryan pushes back his chair and goes out to join them.

When he sits down, cross-legged, next to Pete he opens one eye and then raises his arm to glance at his watch.

"You still have like 45 minutes left," Pete says, he lets his arm fall over Ryan's legs and closes his eyes again.

"I'm finished," Ryan says, he picks a blade of grass and rolls it between his fingers.

Pete cracks an eye open again.

"Finished?"

"My book, it's finished," Ryan shrugs. Like it's nothing important that he finished his book, Pete wants to read it and maybe years and years into the future Ryan will let him.

"I want to read it," Pete says. They've had the same conversation for days, Ryan always says no. He thinks that maybe Pete is just saying what he thinks he should be, it's like he's read a self-help book on repairing broken relationships and Chapter 3 is express an interest in your partners hobbies.

"I don't…"

"I want to read it Ryan," Pete says, his voice is even and careful and his eyes are open and watching Ryan.

"It was just something that I was working on, it's not that good," Ryan says. It needs to be edited and proof read and whole chapters need to be revised, it's definitely not ready for anyone besides Ryan to read.

"You let me be the judge of that."

 

******************************************************************************

They're eating when Spencer and Brendon arrive, Hemmy is sitting under the table at Pete's feet waiting for the inevitable handout, Pete is a sucker when it comes to his dog.

Ryan has been kind of picking at his food, he's waiting for Pete to say something but he doesn't. Ryan has been expecting Brendon and Spencer all day, his nerves are slightly on end and when the knock finally comes he jumps and feels shocked when he realizes that they're here.

He looks around his little cottage and he sees how small it is, and wonders how Pete can stand to be here with him when he's got a veritable mansion waiting for him.

Pete squeezes his hand when he stands up to go let them in, he wants to get up, say 'this is my house, my door, let me do this', instead he sits there and lets Pete kiss his cheek when he passes by.

He hears their voices and he pushes his plate away and stands up, he turns just as Pete leads them into the kitchen.

Spencer looks tired and comes right to Ryan, arms pulling him into a tight hug, Brendon hangs back by the door but Ryan can tell that he wants to be there, when he looks over he lets his lips twist into a slight smile, it isn't totally forced and Brendon walks over to them.

Wraps his arms around both of them together and lays his forehead against Ryan's temple.

From the door Pete just watches, Ryan closes his eyes and lets them hold onto him.

 

******************************************************************************

 


	4. Chapter 4

**A Life Alone – Part 4**

 

 

Ryan shows them around his cottage. Spencer has his arm looped through his, like they’re a young couple walking down the street, enjoying a beautiful spring day.

Brendon keeps his hand pressed against Ryan’s back, like he’s afraid if both of them aren’t touching him at the same time Ryan will flutter away.

“It’s not much,” Ryan says, he feels like he’s apologizing for the size of his cottage. When he’d first moved he’d thought it perfect for him, and it is. It’s just big enough for him to not feel cramped or confined, but with Pete and Spencer and Brendon all there it feels too small now.

It feels like he’s playing house instead of having a home that is his.

“It’s nice,” Spencer says, he sounds like he means it but Ryan still isn’t sure if he can read Spencer anymore. He takes the comment at face value like Spencer most likely intends for him to and relaxes slightly.

Besides, both Spencer and Brendon had smiled when they saw the pictures lining the wall in the front hallway.

Ryan might have left them, might have bought this cottage to have somewhere to go to that wasn’t with them, but he hadn’t cut them totally out of his life.

He’d never be able to do that. He wonders what they see in him that makes them think that he ever could.

As much as he’d like to sometimes, he can’t, they’re the closest things to family that he has.

Pete is trailing behind them, Hemmy had given up on following them and the last time Ryan had seen him he’d been curled up in a patch of fading sunlight in the living room. Ryan thinks that Pete had moved his desk aside so that Hemmy could get to it.

“That’s it,” Ryan says. He’d shown them the kitchen and the living room and his room and the backyard, he’d even shown them the hallway closets that are bigger then the bathroom they used to share on their tour buses.

He’d ended the tour at the spare bedroom they would be sharing and no one had asked where Pete was sleeping though he’d seen the looks that Spencer and Brendon had exchanged.

It’s like they don’t realized that he’s an adult (older then both of them after all) and that he can and will make his own decisions.

Even if there bad ones.

Even if there ones that they don’t agree with.

Spencer pulls him into a hug and squeezes.

“It’s not much,” Ryan says again. It’s probably not where they envisioned him ending up. They probably envisioned him in a four bedroom with a fancy artwork on the walls and a swimming pool in the backyard somewhere near Pete.

They’d probably not expected him to buy a two bedroom cottage in the middle of nowhere that has a great view and artwork by an unknown artist and pictures of them up on the walls.

“It’s perfect,” Spencer says softly, “It’s you.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

Spencer and Brendon have been traveling most of the day so they close themselves into the spare bedroom slightly after ten.

Ryan and Pete stay up, watching movies in the living room, the volume turned down low so as to not disturb their sleeping. Ryan doesn’t think about the fact that they might be having sex in his guestroom.

That they might be the first people having sex in his house.

He’s tired, the build up of emotions waiting for Spencer and Brendon to arrive and finishing his book have all seemed to hit him at once, he feels exhausted through every muscle and bone in his body… then wonders if that is something that can actually be felt.

He’s tired either way.

He hides his yawns behind his hand, his head is on the arm of the couch and his feet are tucked under Pete’s leg. Subconsciously he thinks he’s attempting to fall asleep on the couch, if he can manage it before Pete is ready to go to bed Pete won’t wake him up and it’ll mean less awkward questions and comments in the morning if it looks like one of them is sleeping on the couch.

Pete is having none of that though, when he sees Ryan’s eyes closing he turns off the TV and pulls Ryan to his feet, ignores his protests that the couch is comfortable and propels him down the hallway to his room, Hemmy waddling along behind them.

The guestroom door is closed and Ryan doesn’t glance at it, doesn’t strain his ears to see if he can hear any movement.

He really doesn’t want to know.

He stands in the middle of his bedroom, rubbing at his eyes and Pete shakes his head.

“Pajamas Ryan,” he says gently.

Ryan blinks at him then goes into the bathroom, he leaves his clothes in a pile on the floor as he pulls on sweatpants and a t-shirt, he brushes his teeth and when he looks in the mirror he can see how tired he looks.

Pete appears behind him, already in his own version of pajamas, for a second his hands rest lightly on Ryan’s hips, his forehead pressed against Ryan’s back then he pushes Ryan to the side and plucks his own toothbrush from the cup where Ryan keeps his.

Pete has made himself at home in Ryan’s home, he knows if he looks in the medicine cabinet Pete’s pill bottles will be lined up in a row, if he looks under the sink Pete’s toiletry bag will be stored next to his.

He waits for panic to descend, because Pete is making a life for himself here beside him and that’s not them, never has been.

It’s not even anything he’s ever professed to want, not out loud at least, not to anyone who could _hear_ him.

He looks at Pete in the mirror; watches Pete spit and rinse his mouth, then look back at him with a sly smirk on his lips. He turns his head and looks directly at him, watches as Pete turns his own head and raises an eyebrow in response.

He brushes his lips against Pete’s cheek and hears the sigh more then anything else.

He smiles against Pete’s skin, knows that Pete can feel the curve of his lips and then goes to bed.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Pete is gone when he wakes in the morning; Hemmy is still lying on the foot of the bed so he knows he hasn’t been gone long.

He rolls onto his back and stretches, wonders what they’re going to do all day now that Ryan can’t hide behind his computer writing his book.

Hemmy snuffles and he sits up, the house is quiet and he wonders if Spencer and Brendon are still asleep.

Pete must have closed the bedroom door when he left, probably the only reason that Hemmy was still in the bedroom with him. He leaves it open when he walks toward the kitchen, then stops dead in the doorway.

Brendon is standing at the counter, glass of water in hand, glasses on his face. His hair is sticking up every which way and he looks like he just rolled out of bed.

“They’re arguing about you,” he says and Ryan makes a noise, when he walks closer he can see that Brendon is not just standing at the counter because he’s Brendon and sometimes first thing in the morning he does things that don’t make any sense.

He’s standing at the counter so he can look out the window at Spencer and Pete in the backyard, obviously having an intense conversation. Both their hands are flailing and they both look pissed.

They watch them for a few minutes and Ryan thinks that he should probably say something, should probably storm out there and tell Spencer that he’s a grown up who can make his own choices and if those choices mean that Pete’s going to be in his bed and his life once more then that’s his choice.

He doesn’t because Spencer looks like he’s going to kill somebody and Pete looks like he’s a hand gesture away from biting Spencer’s hand.

“I’m going to go get coffee,” Ryan says. “You’re welcome to come with.” Spencer and Pete look like they could do this for a while; he weighs the chances of one of them being dead when they return if Brendon comes with him and wonders if he should take back the offer so that there is someone with a somewhat level mind making sure they don’t cause irreparable damage to one another.

“You don’t have a coffee maker?” Brendon asks, they both wince when Spencer starts jabbing his finger at Pete. Obviously attempting to make a point.

A point that Pete just as obviously _doesn’t_ agree with, because his eyes narrow and his own fingers comes out.

There’s a pretty good chance that they’re probably going to kill each other before the day is out, with or without chaperones.

Ryan shakes his head, “there’s a place in town I go to.”

“Do you really think that leaving them alone is a smart move?”

Ryan turns away from the window. “They could be at this a while, I for one need caffeine before the two of them come back in here and tell me what decisions they’ve made that are totally in my best interest.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

When they come back, cups and a bag of muffins in hand Pete and Spencer are glaring at each other over the kitchen table.

At least they’re both still alive and not bleeding from any visible wounds.

Brendon sets one of the cups in his hands in front of Spencer and Spencer glares at it like it personally insulted him.

Ryan sets Pete’s coffee down, bags next to him and hides his smirk at Brendon’s eyes rolling by turning to get napkins.

He sits down and sips at his coffee, picking apart his muffin, Brendon is kicking him under the table and Ryan isn’t sure exactly what Brendon wants him to be doing so he just ignores him.

“This isn’t the way that I like my coffee,” Spencer says, he obviously can’t decide which one of them to blame so he starts glaring at Pete again. Brendon coughs and shoves a piece of his muffin into his mouth when Spencer looks over at him.

Ryan leans back in his chair, sips at his own coffee, made to his exact specifications.

“Maybe if you two hadn’t been arguing about how to live my life in the backyard you could have gone with us and got your own damn coffees.”

“We’re not trying to live your life for you,” Spencer starts; Ryan arches a brow at him. Pete is noticeably silent, though Brendon has stopped kicking him and maybe started kicking Spencer because Ryan sees Spencer wince slightly.

“Do you remember how this ended last time?” Spencer asks, he glares at Pete and Pete just looks back at him with no expression on his face. If Spencer says that Pete made him into a fifteen year old girl with the despair and the black and the ultra miserable journal entries (that Spencer never read but that Ryan is sure he knows about) Ryan will have to kill him.

Spencer doesn’t say anything, just looks at Ryan and Ryan looks back at him. They’ve been friends for almost their entire lives.

“Can you guys give us a few minutes,” Ryan says slowly.

“I need to take Hemmy out anyway,” Pete says, pushing himself away from the table. “Brendon why don’t you come with me and get your own version of vetting out of the way.”

“Right then, you’re not going to eat that right?” Brendon asks as he steals the rest of Spencer’s muffin and follows Pete out of the kitchen.

Spencer stares at where his breakfast just disappeared and Ryan shoves his over to him.

“I’m not that kid anymore, Spence,” he says.

“He broke your heart,” Spencer says softly. “You were, well you’ve never _been_ bright and happy, but you were content at least. I wasn’t worried about you slitting your wrists in a hotel room or taking fifteen sleeping pills at one time, and then he broke your heart and you were quiet and withdrawn and…” Ryan reaches out and lays his hand over Spencer’s. “You scared us, you wouldn’t talk to us about it and you just… you scared us.”

“I’m not that kid anymore,” he says again. “And Pete isn’t going to hurt me.”

“How do you know that?”

“I don’t think that he would have followed me here if he was. He certainly wouldn’t have given up Ashlee and argued with Patrick and… I think maybe this time it’ll be different.”

He _hopes_ that this time will be different.

“Ryan,” Spencer says, helplessly.

“We’re not even sleeping together,” Ryan says.

Spencer looks at him, taps his fingers against the table. He looks disbelieving. Ryan can understand why, he and Pete are sharing a room.

“At all?”

“We sleep in the same bed,” Ryan amends. “That’s the extent of our sleeping together.”

Spencer still looks unconvinced.

“I’m a big boy now Spencer, I can take care of myself.”

Spencer snorts at the idea that Ryan can manage his own life without it shredding into pieces at his fingertips and Ryan smiles a little smile at him.

He might not like Spencer trying to manage him, but he does like that Spencer cares enough to try.

“I’ll tell _you_ what I told _him_ , if he hurts you again, I’m going to have to kill him. I don’t care if he _is_ our boss.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

Spencer and Brendon leave after four days. Ryan is happy to see them go, because having the two of them watch while Pete continues his slow, _slow_ courtship dance is painful.

He thinks that it’ll speed up when they leave, but he also thinks that while they’re still there Pete is seeing it as an opportunity to show them (and Ryan) that he’s maybe not the most foolish chance that Ryan has ever taken.

Pete and Spencer come to some sort of agreement, Ryan isn’t present for it, but if Pete doesn’t grope him where Spencer can see, then Spencer doesn’t growl at him.

They stand on the porch and wave as their car leaves.

They don’t have long in the cottage by themselves; Jon and Cassie are due to arrive at the end of the week. Honeymoon over, now it seems it’s their turn to threaten Pete.

They’ll leave on the following Monday and then Patrick and Andy will arrive. He doesn’t think there will be any threatening, but there will probably be plenty of disapproving looks and rolled eyes.

Pete leans into his side and Ryan puts an arm over his shoulder, tugs Pete into a loose hug.

When Pete tilts his head up, wraps his own arms around Ryan’s chest, when he kisses him, _really_ kisses him finally, not one of the pecks or busses or just the barest hint of a kiss…

When Pete finally touches him it doesn’t feel like his heart is going to be broken, it feels like coming home.

 

******************************************************************************

 


End file.
